The Iron Man, the Jötun and the Wardrobe
by Virodeil
Summary: Or "The 12 Days of Winter." – Tony Stark's wardrobe somehow produces wintry wind. So what does he do? Well, take a look, of course. Nobody can blame him for being not curious enough. And then he meets a curious someone or five on the other side, so of course he comes back again, and again, and again, and again. Until, one day….
1. Tony and the Winter Wonder-Cave

The Iron Man, the Jötun and the Wardrobe  
**OR**  
The 12 Days of Winter  
By Rey

**Tony Stark's wardrobe somehow produces wintry wind. So what does he do? Well, take a look, of course. Nobody can blame him for being not curious enough. And then he meets a curious someone or five on the other side, so of course he comes back again, and again, and again, and again. Until, one day….**

(_Inspired by the story __**The Mortal, the Jötun and the Wardrobe**__ by Scarecrowslady/Kakashidiot. Written somewhat in the fashion of the classic song __**The Twelve Days of Christmas**__. Also referring to some elements from the book __**The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe**__ by C. S. Lewis in random places in the story, but __**not**__ a crossover with the narnia fandom._)

Story tags: Sorry Not Sorry, POV Tony stark, implied alcohol as coping mechanism, Tony stark Does What He Wants, Tony Stark's Brand of Language, #coulsonlives (Marvel), Other Fandoms Not Mentioned in Tags, a lot of headcanons, A journey of slow healing, Family History, Slow To Update, Additional Warnings In Author's Note, Additional Warnings Apply, Other Additional Tags to Be Added

Chapter summary: For the first time through the wardrobe the winter gave Tony: a winter wonder-cave.

Started on: 21st September 2019 at 07:30 PM

Finished on: 20th October 2019 at 12:21 PM

1\. Tony and the Winter Wonder-Cave

The first time it happened, Tony had just returned from the end-of-year party held by Stark International for the year 2012, which would continue to the New Year's Eve party, then the New Year party. This time, the annual three-day party was held in Los Angeles, as far away as possible – and practicable, according to Pepper – from New York and the memories that still haunted him.

Well, memories and _curiosity_ of some things that didn't seem to add up, really, but a _drunken_ Tony was never picky about _anything_, including such measly details.

And the night it happened, Tony was sloshed, indeed, mourning what could have been, what had been, and what would be.

Everything in his Los Angeles penthouse seemed to be a cosy surface to drape himself over. But, vaguely remembering Pepper's past remonstrations on his choice of bed, the drunken man tried to sway and stumble and bump his way to a proper bed.

With "try" being the key word.

He ended up camping on the patch of carpeted floor in front of his walk-in closet, dropping right away to sleep, with his head pillowed on one arm; alone as he _had never wanted_. The next day, he woke to find himself massively hungover, his hurting head still pillowed on that arm, his body a mass of aches, and his vicinity far cooler than the norm.

_Far, far cooler_.

He frowned. Well, with how spinning and throbbing and squeezing and stinging his brain felt, he couldn't do more than that, physically. But he could still _think_, and it's what he did to incite that frown in the first place.

Because, last he'd known:  
• His windows here were unopenable except by irrecoverable, messy force;  
• His room ventilation and heating systems were not faulty, monitored regularly as they were;  
• There was _no_ temperature-affecting gismo of any kind in this little wardrobe;  
• He was still in his _formerly warm_ tuxedo; and  
• He wasn't down with some illness that would lower his tolerance to cold temperatures.

And he _could_ bear extremely cold temperatures, anyway, usually; more than people would've expected from a short, slim guy like him.

After Afghanistan, he even _liked_ the cold, in defiance of the memory of heat in his desert prison cave there.

So _why_ did he feel the _deep chill_ presently? _Indoors_ in a well-insulated place, at that?

His frown deepened. All the hungover examination yielded him just one conclusion: There was an intruder in his wardrobe. A _blatant_ intruder that JARVIS had _permited_ entry. A cheeky, ballsy, resourceful someone or something that didn't hesitate to make itself known. Probably one that intruded just for fun, too, since _JARVIS_ had permited them entry, they didn't hide themself, and they hadn't used the time to attack him either.

But, come to think of it again, this _wasn't_ his tower, was it? Here was Los Angeles, his penthouse flat to be exact, _and he hadn't installed JARVIS here_.

`_Goody,_` he thought sourly. `_Just when my world's spinning out of tilt. __**Always**__. Can't they pick a better time to harass me or try to conquer earth?_`

He scowled outright. – No, this thought _wasn't_ right, either, but he couldn't think of anything else at the moment, and he did need some motivation to get him off this comfy bit of flooring. Why? Because Pepper might call him at any time, checking on him as habit dictated from the olden days of PA-dom and girlfriend-dom, and she would lecture him _in this hungover state_ for _hours_.

And on that thought, his achy, rubbery, clumpy muscles _at last_ dragged themselves to budge him away from the all too comfy carpet. – `_Go figure. You can remove Tony out of Pepper but you can't remove Pepper out of Tony._`

Dizzily, laboriously, grumbling to himself all the while, he wriggled up to hands and knees, then crawled just as sluggishly to the source of the chill air, half an arm-span away.

The wooden planks that made up the wardrobe's door felt just as cold as his tuxedo jacket, when his fumbling hand landed on it.

`_It's been going on for some time, then._` – He was egged on by this notion. The lack of Pepper and JARVIS and Happy to deter him just egged him even more.

The two halves of the door opened easily, pried apart down the middle by his impatient fingers. The hinges hadn't been frozen over, then. And… "Whoa!"

The blast of air that greeted him was _wintry_ – beyond cold, beyond chilly, and definitely far colder than wintertime in LA would ever be.

He grinned, although the shock of icy wind on his face made his headache worse.

Anthony Edward Stark had his personal winter wonderland! – What a notion! How delightful! `_Maybe I can bring this wardrobe when I'm dragged by Peps to the tropics!_`

His trouser pocket vibrated. It might be JARVIS, might be Pepper, might be Happy, might be SHIELD, might be someone or something else, or even Rhodey. But he ignored it, just as he ignored his hangover. There was something _far better_ to focus on, after all; away from his minders' fretful remonstrations, at that.

He squeezed into the gap made by the two halves of the door and felt about for the light switch along the wooden panelling. The lamp refused to turn on, though, however often his fingers seesawed the switch button, so he resorted to using his hands and feet as his eyes.

The multitude of clothes brushed and dragged across his frame as, with arms spread out and fingertips trailing on the left and right side of the wardrobe, he advanced slowly but surely further into it.

He never met the back end, though.

He met a wall of icy, icy air, instead.

Icy but so, so fresh, accentuating a dim environment of ice-layered permafrost.

Like wintertime in his Antarctic bunker….

His head throbbed extra enthusiastically, faced with such a contrastively chilly temperature. But his grin – which might seem manic to anybody who saw it, he admitted – couldn't be wider, literally and figuratively.

In his early childhood, his mother, in the very, very rare "bonding time" they'd had, had loved to read _The Chronicles of Narnia_ to him. And his favourite book in that series had been _The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe_. Specifically the part where the children in that book found a country in winter through a wardrobe, which had made him think, `_Someday, I can escape through a wardrobe and leave everything behind!_`

The dream remained until now, apparently, and he was about to live it _very, very soon_.

Pepper wanted him to stop "heroing." Well, this _wasn't_ heroing. Just some _adventuring_, and not the sort that could make him appear on the mass media in an _un_favourable light… maybe….

And if it's true, he needn't fly far to experience some wintry hermitage! He could buy this apartment complex and move his bots and his labs and his things here!

So, in short order, he layered himself with all the jackets, trousers, socks, gloves and woolly hats that he could find in the wardrobe proper. And then he exchanged his dress shoes with a pair of old but sturdy boots he found nestled beside the said wardrobe, before filling an equally old army pack that he found squished under the boots with all sorts of necessary things: foods, drinks, a handy multitool, a portable heater for room and sustenance, a box of bits and bobs, and the like. As a reluctant afterthought, to avoid unneeded hassle later on, he told JARVIS via phone to tell everyone that he would be off for a while.

And then he was really off, almost skipping his way past the line between wooden panelling and glistening permafrost. Adventure, at last!

The world beyond the wardrobe's nonexistent back end was populated with looming boulders and smaller rocks. It might be part of a cave, or a cliff, or a canyon, or even the "artistically rugged" outside wall of a home. For now, Tony didn't care about it. He just wanted to _explore_.

So, shivering hard but still grinning, he advanced slowly but surely among the boulders, stones and pebbles, coming closer and closer to where the source of the light and the fresher air seemed to be. Various observations flew about in his mind, meanwhile: about how to improve this place to generate income _if_ he wanted it, about the possible composites of these rocks that he might exploit _at another time_, about how he should really create that subzero Iron Man suit for cases like this, and many, many more.

And then, he came upon a far cleaner, far lighter, if far colder place, from behind what looked like a natural wall of relatively small stones stacked on top of each other. The whole space was illuminated by some kind of dim yellow light from outside, making the layers of ice – which seemed to be thicker in this area – glitter and glisten with dull golden sheen.

It was _beautiful_, in a subdued way. Perfect for his hungover state.

Perfect for relaxation, too, and he didn't hesitate from claiming the whole thing as his own.

It took him three trips, with increasing anxiety that the portal would no longer be there when he was back, to gather everything that he needed and deposit the lot in his home-away-from-home.

Well, _almost_ everything, really. He still missed some comforting, comfortable company. But for the present, it was enough.

Mini arc reactors embedded in the portable multifunction heater, under the tabletop, in the air bed and in the super-thick, super-fluffy, super-soft quilt kept the temperature survivable despite the open frigid air. The same treated wooden panels that layered the floor of his Antarctic bunker prevented all the localised heat from melting the ice, and a fur rug completed the ambience.

And of course, it wouldn't be Tony Stark the genius engineer without his labs. Everything he needed for his tinkerings got arrayed at the other side of his air bed, further into the cave but not beyond the natural wall, opposite his living area. And in this way, he could test a lot of subzero equipments right from his bed!

Truly a dream come true.

As the happy forty turned mentally four snuggled deep in his new, newly arranged bed and stared at the dim, soft yellow light reflected on the uneven natural ceiling far above, he wondered whom he could coax to come with him next time, to really, really complete his bliss.

Enjoying a nice thing was so, so much better with an agreeable company, after all, as he'd learnt a long, long, long time ago, when he'd shared _The Chronicles of Narnia_ with his mum.

Now, he just hoped nothing and nobody like the evil winter witch would "crash the party," as it were. He wouldn't be responsible for any death or damage, if so, because he _really, really, really_ didn't like to be bothered when he was feeling comfy, and he was feeling comfy _indeed_, and he'd like to make this place safe for whoever he could get to come with him next, and they wouldn't be safe if the evil winter witch went rampaging.

And if it took him praying to the lion – well, the _Lion_, according to the story – for a peaceful place to relax to tinker and tinker in relaxation, he bloody _would_.

This winter wonder-cave was worth many, many things he wouldn't usually do.

He could even _live_ here.


	2. Tony and the Sad Bratty Brat

The Iron Man, the Jötun and the Wardrobe  
By Rey

Chapter summary: For the second time through the wardrobe the winter gave Tony: a winter wonder-cave and a sad bratty brat.

Started on: 22nd October 2019 at 08:43 PM

Finished on: 20th July 2020 at 07:24 PM

2\. Tony and the Sad Bratty Brat

The second time it happened, after thirty days of freaking out and moping for being locked away from his wintry getaway, Tony was in an overpaid hotel room after an unsatisfactory one-night stand, of all things. It was 3 AM in the morning, his bladder was torturing him, his head was once again in the throes of hangover, and his partner for the night had slipped away somewhere else.

He was _completely alone __**again**_, with not even JARVIS and his bots for company.

Stumbling his way to the loo while cursing many, many things, chief of which was his sheer inability to get over his lost wintry getaway nook, he passed the knock-off walk-in wardrobe that the bedroom of this suite sported…

…Which was emanating some _strong, ever so familiar chill_.

`_Probably a hole in the wall in the wardrobe; a cheap thing like that, in a room full of cheap things trying to look expensive,_` was what he thought, then, while the majority of his mind was occupied with emptying his bladder, and also procuring more alcohol to both get rid of the hangover and forget his ever-encroaching feeling of loneliness.

`_But if it __**isn't**__?_` a tiny, ever-hopeful part whispered timidly, peeking up amongst all the bitterness.

And so, back from the loo, he jerked the wardrobe door open, bracing himself for the usual sting of heavy disappointment.

But this time, instead of the mundane, unappealing back of the wardrobe, done in wooden panels, tiles or plaster, he found the familiar vista of looming boulders and smaller rocks: ice-layered and bathed in shadows that might turn into a dull yellow sheen soon after – _that had turned that colour last time_.

Whooping in delight and glee, and grinning wider than he had ever in these interminable thirty days, he activated a line with JARVIS via his Starkwatch, without budging an inch from the opening to his secret little paradise. Then he ordered his AI to bring the things he had long prepared for just this occasion to his hotel room, thanking his luck that the hotel he was held in wasn't far from his mansion in Maliboo – at least from what he remembered.

And, within an hour (although quite a tortuous hour it was!), Anthony Edward Stark was ready to reclaim his lost winter wonderland: garbed in his best Antarctic gear that could be easily taken on and off in case he was craving some refreshing chill, hefting a bulging carrier backpack of necessities on his back, toting a suitcased subzero Iron Man suit in one hand, and leading a heavily modified ATV by the handle in the other hand, which was _also_ heavily loaded with supplies.

Everyone had told him, repeatedly, that something in him had been… different, _changed_, after his impromptu absence from the remaining parties his own company had hosted, although they could never told him what had actually changed. But he knew. His senses had sharpened, all his clothes had become a little too tight and short in _all_ directions despite his _lack_ of growing pudginess, and his voice had also changed very, very slightly. _And_ it might have been the fault of the winter wonderland beyond the wardrobe, since he'd stayed there – or rather, in _his_ cave there – for a full week, which surprisingly amounted to just two days and a tiny bit more on earth, but he _didn't care_. He even planned to stay for _at least_ a fortnight, this time, and had even prepared for double that time.

It was truly like his alcohol cravings, which he knew would lead to massive hangovers, but he gozzled down all the bottles of blissful forgetfulness _anyway_, and even stocked up double the amount in his every residence.

Although, strangely enough, he only brought a crate of brandy for this excursion; as a handy fire-starter and makeshift first-aid disinfectant more than anything else, even.

But, well, he wouldn't get _anywhere_ if he dawdled like this, would he? Time was ticking away, and the moody portal might collapse right in front of him _just_ because he'd taken too long. It's just that bitchy and stingy to him.

He felt like he'd missed something, one more bit of preparation or two that he should have done. But he marched into the wardrobe anyhow, towing the compact ATV after him, with his heart pounding, his body atingle, and his belly warm with excitement. His snowboots thumped softly but solidly on the cheap wooden panelling of the wardrobe, then the rubber-and-sharp-chain tyres of his ATV squeak-clacked on it.

He revelled in the softer, rustle-slither-sklick sounds his boots and ATV tyres made when the flooring changed from the cheap wooden panelling to rough, pristine, ice-layered amalgamation of variously sized stones. `_It's all __**real**__!_` And the refreshing chill was undeniably _there_, surrounding him in a thorough, continuous huggle. `_Perfect!_` His face hurt with how wide he grinned and how long he'd been maintaining it, but it's a good hurt, and he revelled in it _as well_.

He _needed_ such bits of happiness, after all, so he took it as it came without a fuss. There'd been too little to be happy about, lately, even though he was still in at least moderately good terms and communications with Pepper, Happy, Rhodey and the so-called "Avengers." The culprits of his _un_happiness were the various nightmares which had plagued him since the Battle of New York, and especially this last month, most of which had turned fuzzy or forgotten when he'd woken up but haunting him throughout the day anyway.

But, come to think of it, he hadn't suffered from _any_ nightmares in his bed here. And this meant he could look forward to _a good, long nap_.

On that thought, he sped up, going as far as using the ATV's handlebar as a crutch as he slipped and slid his way to the wall of stacked stones that hid this portal from the smoother, cleaner, more open part of the cave. His bed was waiting!

The light that greeted him as he went past the space where the wall didn't cover was different: brighter, blue-white instead of yellow-white. It painted everything there differently, but he didn't mind the change. It's interesting, actually, to see how sharp and clean everything looked now.

He did mind it, though, when he found his little lab right by the wall _messed up_, instead of just broken as if trampled by a visiting animal or ruined by the subzero temperature. He hadn't noticed it at first, distracted by the crisp sheen on things, given by the new kind of illumination that reminded him of his arc reactor, but now the _sabotage_ stood out. – A pair of crystal jars that had used to sit on a high, large, _sturdy_ shelf were shattered on the wooden floor below, in pieces too small to have been naturally caused but all too possible to have been stomped on by boots. The special laptop he'd made for just such low temperatures, previously stored in the _intricately locked box_ set by his bed, was now a dented and slightly cracked sad thing resting haphazardly near the pried-open box, too. And then he found that the arc-reactor generator he'd also stored in the box was _missing_ alongside its cables and a few other little things. His air bed was _slashed open_, furthermore, and the quilt that had covered it was _also_ missing. The fur rug spread opposite the lab area was slashed, balded in patches and dirty as hell, and, to top it all off, the warmer box that rested before it had been pried open to be ransacked and… just… _messed up_. Half-gone, frozen packaged foods and drinks were scattered _everywhere_ on the rug, pried open and trampled and crushed.

No animal _anywhere_ was this clever, thorough, and… well, either just plain vicious or vengeful. Only _sentients_ do this, either bullies or vindictive natives.

Vindictive natives would've left a message telling him not so politely to fuck off, though….

A bully, then, or _several_ of such. And possibly _the_ evil winter-witch, going by the theme of his childhood story.

Tony didn't know whether he should be relieved that the evil winter-witch had been there and gone again, or angry that he'd been robbed the chance to confront her directly and probably save his things as well as his cave.

He definitely felt vengeful, regardless. – This was his _sanctuary_, he had bothered _nobody_, and he'd been paid with… _this_.

The evil winter-witch was going to _get it_. But of course, this would need careful planning, and more equipment than what he had with him now. He'd need to clean everything up first, as well, and he kso _hated_ cleaning up. It's one of the reasons why he'd made You, actually….

`_Hmm. You. – I did adjust him and his brothers for Antarctic climate when I made that spiffy bunker in the South Pole, didn't I? But how if that witch returns when You's here? Oh, no, __**no**__. If she hurt any piece on him…._`

Scowling, the irritated, offended cave holiday-maker – and cave _owner_, if he had any say in it – parked his ATV safely behind the wall, tied his carrier pack securely to its seat, then activated his Iron Man suit in centry mode. He tucked a pair of arc-tech pistols into his belt for good measure, before beckoning the suit to shadow him.

The trash went first into the disposal bag, then the fur rug. The cracked laptop got packed back into the "safety" deposit box alongside the salvageable things, before the box got dumped behind the wall by the Iron Man suit. And then Tony got to work sweeping and waxing the scarred wooden floor by hand. Like old-man Jarvis had taught him a long, long, long time ago, just because little him had been curious about what the man had been doing.

`_Damn. Old man, I miss you._` His heart ached with a familiar pain of loss and loneliness, and it just angered him more. `_Sentimental fool that I am._` He worked harder, faster, but the ache receded only when he was finished with the task.

Of course, then, he had to get busy replacing what had been broken or missing, at least for the bedroom area. Because "Your bedroom should be your sanctuary," old-man Jarvis had always said, and Tony had always heeded him rather than Howard Stark, and–.

`_What's that noise?_`

There had just been a tiny, half tinkling, half slithering sound, like fine chains on rocks or something like that.

And that sound had been so _near_.

Letting go of the half-pumped air bed, Tony whirled round and stepped back blindly while fishing out both pistols from their hip holsters. "Who's there?" he hissed, because _something_ told him it's a who, not a what. Maybe the one ransacking and pillaging his sanctuary?

The sound came again, and again, and again. From each repetition, it became easier and easier to pinpoint where it came from.

It's from the direction of the patch of bare stone just beyond his little area. Right beside the warmer box, in fact.

_Right beside where he'd spent __**much time**__ trying to salvage and reorder his digestible provisions._

"Who's there?" he repeated, with wildly thumping heart, as he trained his pistols there. But the reply was only more chain clinking and slithering on the rock.

It took him barely a second to decide to approach the problem more physically, namely by walking over and–.

`_And what?_` his mind nudged him, and he stopped dead, barely a pace away from the source of the sound. `_Shoot it? Hit it? __**Beat**__ it?_`

In the end, he ordered JARVIS to secure the uninvited guest via the Iron Man suit.

"J?" he prompted when the suit just… crouched there, unmoving, beside the spot he'd pinpointed as the source of the mysterious noise, in the pose of holding someone – of a rather ordinary height for an adult – down by the shoulders.

"My visual sensors detect nothing but a low-temperature silhouette, Sir," was the report, followed with, "The person is alive but restrained, Sir."

`_Scapegoat._` The conclusion was so easy to derive. It made Tony all the more suspicious. `_Why set up something like this? Too blatant. Too provocative. Too convenient._` And so, he came to the next one: `_Bait. Bait and scapegoat and minion rolled into one, maybe, like the evil winter-witch from that book with that traitor boy._`

His mouth dried up. `_Should I call everyone, then? Do I have time? Will the portal still be there if I leave to fetch them? Will I even have the chance?_`

`_No,_` he decided in the end. And with that in mind, he holstered his pistols, before taking the last step towards the mystery person, physically and figuratively.

"Keep a lookout, J," he told his AI just as his hand landed on an invisible, bony shoulder. "We'll be fine here, won't we?" he added when the Iron Man suit didn't budge, while squeezing the invisible shoulder in both warning and an attempt at comfort.

"Now, I assume you can't talk?" he addressed the mystery person, once JARVIS had positioned the suit nearby, ever swivelling and ever watching. "So, got no other choice, here. Got to pat you down to even know what you are, let alone guess at who you are. If you're good, I might even try to free you."

He did just that, a second after: patting the mystery person from head to foot, from side to side, paying the most attention to the chains wrapped round their ankles and wrists, also the metallic-seeming gag that covered their lower face just under the nose.

`_Can't talk, indeed._` He winced inside. It's far from the first time he put his foot in his mouth, though, and likely far from the last time, either, so he quickly went past it. Besides, there's a greater concern to address, namely the eerie similarity that this person had with _Loki_ the space-reindeer invader.

`_Or is it __**really**__ Loki, here? But if it's Loki, then why's he __**here**__? Since when? Has he been chained and gagged __**all this time**__? It's been more than __**half a year**__! Who trashed __**my**__ cave, anyway? The chains are all anchored to the floor, so it can't be this one, but then __**who**__?_`

He got out his laser cutter, meanwhile, and began hacking at the chains as near as he dared to the skin of the mystery person.

The more chains he managed to sever, the more visible the mystery person was, working up from a very faint outline to a silhouette to the whole picture.

And what a picture he got, when all the chains got severed!

"Huh…. Reindeer Games, you're a sad sight for sore eyes."


End file.
